So I am in the military currently stationed in England, I plan on moving back to Texas when my enlistment is up and recently inherited a 93/4.9l/longbed. I will have about 10,000 desposible to put into the truck.
It it comes from Chicago so there is some rust, and I don't know much about metal fan/restoration as my strong point is motor/trans/fuel rebuilds. i guess my request is what would you guys do and is it even worth throwing the money into the truck? I want to use it as a daily driver and be able to take it to a deer lease with minimal issues, I'd like to keep it relatively stock besides mabey some air induction and exhaust to hopefully help the motor out a bit.

 

give the truck a good going over making sure the frame and suspension are good. they tend to rot out behind the front shock towers and rear sections of the frame where the rear tank sits. if they are rotted out then you will have to make a decision. is it worth taking back to Texas. if it has low miles and runs good it could be worth keeping the engine / trans and finding a good body from Texas too put it in.

 

The bottleneck is the head on this engine. The intake is plenty big enough and the EFI split exhaust manifold is the best option. Swap in an aftermarket converter if you suspect the original(s) are bad.

 

Thanks for the advice! I've never messed around with the 300 but with it being a 4.9/6 I can only imagine that it has plenty of low end. Are you familiar with any know issues that come with the engine? Also, the truck is already in Texas waiting on me, the in laws brought it down from Illinois years back and they just use it for odds/ends. With that being said, do they make an upgrade for the wire harness? I checked google and everything was grey on the issue. Also, brake upgrades?

 

The 4.9L engine is pretty tough. It is a basic engine that started life as a tractor/industrial engine. How it managed to stay in service to 1996 is beyond me. I have seen a few posts where the timing gear gave up after 150k+ miles.

What kind of "wire harness upgrade" are you referring?